How Abbott Labs’ vision for health care and digital tech is coming together

Anjalee Khemlani joins the Yahoo Finance panel to discuss her interview with Abbott CEO Robert Ford, which touched upon topics that included the company's historic keynote address at CES, Robert Ford's adjustment to taking the reins of Abbott, and the importance of healthcare technology.

Video Transcript

[MUSIC PLAYING]

- I had to ask our Anjalee Khemlani to repeat it during the commercial break, because it's an interesting and surprising piece of news. For the first time, a health care company is going to be headlining the Consumer Electronics Show. And Anjalee had the chance to speak to said health company and the head of it. Anjalee, tell us about it.

ANJALEE KHEMLANI: That's right, Julie. So the CEO-- and new CEO of Abbott Laboratories, who has taken over, and just a year later is faced with this very interesting announcement, spoke to me in his first ever wide ranging interview about taking the helm of the company in the middle of a pandemic as well as what this really means, the significance of a health care company, and what that means for the health tech sector, largely. Listen to what he had to say and more.

ROBERT FORD: Well, I'm really excited. Abbott's very excited to be able to deliver the keynote at the CS 2022, especially since it will be a live event this year. And it's really important, because we're the first health care company ever to deliver that keynote address. And I think it's very appropriate.

I think it's very timely that a health care company does deliver that keynote, obviously, for two reasons. One, we've been through this incredible experience with the COVID and the pandemic, and the importance of Health is this front and center for sure. But I also think it's important because of this convergence we're seeing between health care technology and digital technology coming together. That's a clear trend that's been occurring for the last, at least, five, six years that we've been seeing. So I think it's very timely and appropriate for us to be able to be part of this.

ANJALEE KHEMLANI: Absolutely. And that, of course, has come front and center, really, in the middle of the pandemic. So I want to ask you about that. Let's start with that, first, which is you taking the helm of Abbott and the middle of the pandemic. You know, we knew that you were going to be taking over well before, but the pandemic just sort of came in the middle. What was that like? What were some of the things that you, sort of, had conscious moments of-- that you couldn't believe were happening.

ROBERT FORD: Well I'd say, first of all, there was no playbook for this. So I think not only new CEOs, like myself, but even very experienced CEOs, we're all, kind of, really, having to make decisions with a new set of experiences, and learning a lot as we made those decisions. But I would say for me, specifically for Abbott, I took over a company that was in really great shape. We had tremendous organic growth. We had a very rich pipeline, a lot of health technology that we were developing.

So I took over a company that was in really great shape. I think another key aspect of that is mission and purpose. And that's so important today for both for me and, obviously, for all the Abbott employees. And to be at a health care company during a pandemic, it's almost like, OK, this is when your number is really being called. This is for moments that Abbott was built for. So I think that was very powerful for all of us to reconnect to our mission and our purpose.

And I have a great team. We have a great, passionate group of employees, and a team that's dedicated and committed. So while there wasn't any playbook, if you put all those, kind of, components together, it definitely made navigating a little bit easier. But there were definitely some challenges, for sure.

ANJALEE KHEMLANI: I can imagine. I wonder know, of course, being in the pandemic led to a lot of really interesting, sort of, changes in consumer behavior, one of those specifically being health tech. And I know that's something that really is a big part of the company. But let's focus on the product itself that really gave the attention to Abbott. And that's a BinaxNOW rapid test. Started off really helping support government efforts, and now they're on the shelves. They're accessible to everyone.

And this is coming at a time where, you know, we've seen this pivot from consumerism and at home tests, which were sort of a niche market, before. Do you feel like this is an area that Abbott can really capitalize on?

ROBERT FORD: Well, for sure I think, you know, we've long believed in the trend to decentralize some of the testing. It's not an either or, it's an and. So a lot of testing, historically, has been done in hospitals and labs. And what we see now, with COVID, is this trend to be able to add on a different type of testing-- one that's a little bit more decentralized, that consumers can go to a pharmacy or they can go to a physician's office and airports and hotels, right? So there's this complete decentralization, I think is very positive for the entire diagnostic business.

We also talk about the digitization of it, right. And we've seen a lot of that activity of medical devices with digital. And what you saw in COVID was Abbott's understanding of the importance of that digitization. So not only do we develop the Binax test, but we also develop a companion app called NAVICA that connects the test with your phone, so that you can have your green pass to say, hey, I tested, and I've been tested negative. So I think that's an important aspect of it.

And then the third piece, Anjalee, is this aspect of democratization. And it's a word that gets thrown out there. But we really, truly believe in that. So when we launched Binax, if you remember, a lot of the rapid tests were costing $100, $150 to get a test. And we went out, and we launched that $5 to really make it accessible and be able to build scale.

So I think those three aspects, digitize, democratize, and decentralize-- not only did you see that with COVID, but ultimately, that's our vision. That's our view of how health care technology and digital technology will be able to come together.

ANJALEE KHEMLANI: Obviously, we've known and seen throughout the pandemic that health technology and devices generally accessible to consumers has really seen a huge growth. So it seems like Abbott is ready to capitalize on that. Back to you guys.

- Anjalee, thanks so much for bringing us that conversation, appreciate it.